Sparking Joy
by LadyDivine91
Summary: Kurt wants to Marie Kondo their home, but Blaine is struggling with how to deal with things that 'spark joy'. In the end, Kurt discovers that Blaine's method might be the best. Klaine. Kurt H. Blaine A.


_Thunk_!

Blaine startles in his seat when an object drops out of nowhere and lands heavily on the living room floor. He'd been spending a relaxing morning and most of the early afternoon catching up on the latest issues of _Variety_!, his daughter Tracy hanging out with him, watching re-runs of _Total Drama Island_ on her phone. He's embarrassed to admit that, till that moment, he didn't know what his husband was up to. Kurt usually spends his weekends designing new outfits or hitting up second hand stores, searching for inspiration.

Seeing Kurt standing in front of him, hands on hips, staring as if expecting an answer to an unasked question, Blaine realizes - not this weekend.

At Kurt's feet sits a large cardboard box, edges white, corners worn from age, lopsided due to a decade sinking into the carpet at the bottom of a closet.

Blaine looks at the box, then at his husband, eyes glued to Blaine's face.

"Uh … what's going on, honey?" Blaine asks.

"It's April 6th, _darling_."

"Yes, it is," Blaine agrees, looking over at his pre-teen daughter, who shrugs and goes back to her iPhone screen. "And that means …?"

"Today is the day we said we'd Marie Kondo the heck out of this place!"

"Oh." Blaine nods, recognizing the reference vaguely in his confusion. "Yeah. Right. We're … Kondo-ing our condo."

"I knew you'd forget!"

"I didn't forget. I just … didn't exactly remember until now."

"You promised you'd help me with this! This place is turning into a hoarder's paradise! _Lifetime_ is going to break down our door any day now and put us on TV!"

Blaine scans their stylish but minimally decorated living room – an impressive space that contains two sofas, a coffee table, and a piano. But aside from a slew of family photos on the walls (organized by date in color coordinated frames), there's little else, definitely nothing that would warrant the label 'hoarder'. Other rooms are much the same: clothes and shoes in closets categorized by use, subcategorized by season and color; with bookcases and cubbies to handle everything else. "What? Where are you getting that from?"

"I get that from your stack of magazines by the toilet in the master bathroom and our combined army of boxes in the top and bottom of every closet."

"That's it? That's your definition of _hoarder_?"

"This is box number one of fifteen that _you_ are responsible for going through," Kurt continues. "Just follow the KonMari method: go through the box and touch every object. If it sparks joy and you can visualize a place to put it, set it aside. If not, thank it and put it back in the box. Once you're done, put the box in the hall with the rest of our donations and move on to another box."

"Got it." Blaine moves from his comfy spot on the sofa to the hard wood floor. "I'll get on it."

"See that you do." Kurt pivots on the ball of his foot and shuffles back to the master bedroom, where he's been going through his own fair share of boxes to see what sparks joy. Blaine honestly forgot, but he remembers now – he and Kurt watching Marie Kondo explain her method on _Ellen_, and them reminiscing how they had boxes in their closet they hadn't opened since high school. In the moment, Blaine was as excited as Kurt to begin. But after giving it thought, he wasn't sure he wanted to part with anything from his past.

Plus, the whole process seemed incredibly overwhelming.

"Welp, one box at a time," he mutters, opening the soft flaps. "What do we have in here? Oh … my … _God_ …"

"What is that?" Tracy takes a seat beside her father on the floor as he pulls a thick gold chain with a circular amulet hanging off it from the top of the box.

"It's part of a costume I wore for an ABBA routine the Glee Club did back in high school." Blaine shakes his head, a slow smile spreading across his lips. "It was kind of a bittersweet time because your dad and I weren't together, but I always knew we'd end up this way in the end. I can't believe he'd expect me to give this up."

"Desperate times call for desperate measures, Daddy. Can I have it?"

Blaine stares at his daughter, hand already extended to receive. "Just like your mother," he says, handing the necklace over since he can't imagine when he'd ever wear it again. "Subtle as a sledgehammer."

"I'll take that as a compliment," she says, slipping the chain over her head. "What else is in there?"

"I think these are … yeah …" Blaine laughs as he pulls out what looks like a fighter pilot's helmet "… these are all parts of old costumes I wore back in high school."

"How many musicals did you guys put on?" Tracy asks, rifling through the contents of the box.

"Two. But a lot of impromptu stuff went on in the choir room."

"I guess."

"Look at these! My yellow sunglasses! Oh, and my Dalton blazer!"

"Were you a cheerleader?" Tracy snickers, holding up a white and red shirt for her father to see.

"Yes," he says, snatching it away. "Don't judge. So was your father."

"No!"

"Yes, ma'am. He was also on the football team."

"_My_ Papa? Sorry. Can't see it."

Blaine spots a copy of their school yearbook from his junior/Kurt's senior year. Kurt's father had purchased a two page spread with pictures of Kurt from kindergarten through graduation. He knows there's a pic of Kurt in his football uniform in there somewhere. He flips to the back and finds it. "See for yourself …"

Tracy takes the book and squints at the page, looking for any resemblance between the boy in the photograph, so thin that his protective gear amounts for two-thirds of his body, and her Papa. "Awww! He's so cute!"

"Yes," Blaine says, pulling out another yearbook and flipping through the pages, searching for another picture of Kurt, this time as a member of the Warblers. He grins, and adds under his breath: "_Dirty_ cute."

* * *

Kurt slides another box down the hallway and tetrises it into place. He stands up straight, stretching his sore back as he surveys the boxes he has compiled by the front door. He runs a hand through his hair, wincing when he feels it weighed down by dust. He's going to have to take a shower before he makes dinner. He's too hungry to shower, and too exhausted to cook. He could order in, but by the looks of those boxes, he may have accidentally blocked the door. He could ask Blaine to cook, or to move the boxes for the delivery guy, but he's too bitter to do either. Kurt has spent the whole day tackling the job they were supposed to do together. By Kurt's calculations, he's pared down a metric ton of junk.

Blaine has possibly rearranged the contents of one large box. Kurt won't know until he checks in on him.

Kurt _should_ give his husband a chance to prove him wrong. They haven't spoken for hours, so he doesn't know what Blaine has or hasn't done. But considering he never voluntarily came to the bedroom in search of a second box, he has his doubts.

Kurt trudges down the hall towards the living room. He hears Blaine talking and Tracy giggling, but he can't make out what they're saying. When he turns the corner, he's pleasantly surprised to find Blaine's box closed up and waiting patiently to take its place by the front door. Kurt smiles, relieved. Blaine _did_ take this seriously after all. Good! But Kurt feels a small pang of guilt. He should have given Blaine a bit more credit. He should apologize.

He hears Tracy giggle again and decides to take a break from working to see what's so funny. Both his husband and his daughter are sitting on the floor, hidden from view by the sofa. Kurt tiptoes in, but a few steps closer, he stops, crosses his arms, and sighs a long, exasperated sigh. Without saying a word, Kurt goes back to Blaine's box and picks it up. It's light as a feather. He gives it a shake to confirm his suspicions, then tosses it aside.

It's empty.

"Blaine!" he groans, storming back into the living room to confront the man sitting amid a pile of every single item that had been packed in that box, and _wearing_ most of it. "We talked about this!"

"I know," Blaine says, putting up his hands in surrender and huddling closer to his daughter, hoping for the protection that comes from hiding behind an innocent child, "but I can't help it, Kurt! Everything in that box sparked joy! It was from one of the best times in my life!"

"Blaine! Those things were from _high school_!"

"A-ha …"

"No one in the world thinks that high school is one of the best times in their lives!"

"I do!"

"How!? You got jumped outside a school dance, remember?"

"Yeah, but it's also when I met you!"

Kurt stops ranting. He can't argue with that. He's often said that only a handful of good came from having to suffer the hell that was high school, and one of those was meeting Blaine. He has to admit, giving away mementos from that time was excruciating for him. But it had to be done. They have way too much stuff sitting in boxes. Kurt isn't throwing them in the trash or sending them off to Goodwill. They're not even giving them _away_ away. The majority of his old costumes and props are being re-homed to the theater arts program at Tracy's school. The next time the Harvey Milk School puts on a performance of _West Side Story_ or _Grease_, Kurt will be able to revisit his old costumes and remember the good times.

Obviously, Blaine doesn't feel the same way.

Kurt can't be mad. He knows how sentimental his husband is. That's one of the reasons he loves him.

Kurt looks at his ridiculous husband and their daughter, both decked out in everything Kurt had seen in that box – feather boas, a furry red jacket, Blaine's old cheerleading top, a black top hat. Spread out around them are the only things he thought Blaine might keep – yearbooks, scrapbooks, journals, all open to various pages, displaying pictures from "the good old" days … and days Kurt didn't think were so good at the time.

The New Directions the year they won Nationals.

Kurt as Officer Krupke tucked beside a picture of Blaine as Tony.

A candid of Blaine dressed in his cheerleading uniform, hula hooping with Tina in the school gymnasium.

Kurt and Blaine at prom the year Kurt was crowned queen.

Seeing these years of their lives spread out in the open on the living room floor, Tracy's giggling makes sense. Not only was Blaine rescuing the things he felt sparked joy, he was sharing that joy with their daughter … something Kurt, in his haste to clean before the end of the weekend, had neglected to do.

Kurt steps around the sofa, picks his way through the books and the costumes, and joins Blaine and Tracy on the floor.

"I'm sorry, Kurt. I guess I'm not good at the KonMari method," Blaine says, offering a hand to help his tired husband to the ground.

"Don't worry about it. It's not that big a deal."

"Didn't you find anything that sparked joy?"

Kurt puts a hand on his husband's knee and rests his head on his shoulder. He peeks up at Blaine's face and smiles. "I sure did."


End file.
